1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing function of an electronic endoscope apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
An electronic endoscope apparatus is normally provided as a set of a plurality of electronic endoscopes which have different thicknesses and resolutions from each other and a processing apparatus which performs processing on images obtained by endoscopy so that the images become appropriate for output at a monitor. Therefore, it is necessary that the processing apparatus can perform processing on images obtained by each of the electronic endoscopes of the same electronic endoscope apparatus so as to output images which have appropriate qualities at the monitor.
As an invention for solving the problem as described above, an apparatus which has a function of restricting an image zoom function based on the number of pixels of a CCD (Charge Coupled Device) of an electronic endoscope by detecting the type of the CCD at the processing apparatus is disclosed in U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 20050020879, for example.
Further, the processing apparatus of the electronic endoscope apparatus normally has an image processing function for improving the qualities of images. The apparatus disclosed in U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 20050020879 also has a color tone adjustment circuit and a structure enhancement circuit.
As described above, the conventional electronic endoscope apparatus includes a processing apparatus and a plurality of kinds of electronic endoscopes. In the electronic endoscope apparatus, the same type of CCD (Charge Coupled Device) produced by the same manufacturer is mounted on each of the electronic endoscopes, and only the resolution of the CCD is different from each other.
However, the inventor of the present invention or the like is considering mounting CCD's which are produced by different manufacturers from each other, and which use different kinds of color filters from each other. If such CCD's are mounted, the color obtainment methods of the CCD's are different from each other.
However, although the kind of the CCD is judged in the apparatus disclosed in U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 20050020879, the result of judgment is not used in the color tone adjustment circuit of the apparatus. Under the circumstance as described above, it was not necessary to adjust the brightness level or color of an image based on the kind of the CCD. Further, more complex processing is required to adjust the color compared with processing for adjusting the number of pixels. Therefore, an electronic endoscope apparatus which has a function of adjusting the color has not been provided.